Big late season SBT ActionMark Gercovich | First Published: July 2009

Just when you thought the tuna season was winding up and it was all about getting smaller fish in closer to the coast, the waters off Warrnambool threw up some more surprises in this amazing season.

Recently Greg Attwell and Clayton Smith captured a 70kg southern bluefin tuna (SBT) in 60m off Warrnambool. A bigger fish was also lost on the same day. Around a week later Steve Rhook, fishing in Bruce Ludeman’s boat, in 60m deep water off Point Fairy landed a 100kg bluefin. Heavy drag settings and good teamwork saw the fish to boat in 30 minutes – a great effort. School sized tuna have continued to be taken right along the South West Coast, even as far west as Port Campbell where some of the locals getting amongst the fish.

Surely by August the SBT season will have come to a close, but who knows – it kicks on in Tasmanian waters through August. But if you’re struggling to cope without a tuna fix it will only be around five months before anglers will be out searching for the first fish of the 2010 season. Anglers should also note that the boat ramp at Warrnambool harbor was closed as of July for some basic alterations – hopefully it is back open soon.

Hopkins Bream

The Hopkins River has been producing some big bream of late, as it often does during these cooler months. Barry Johnston has been getting amongst the big bream recently with his best fish a cracking 48cm full length bream. Stewie McKinnon and I had a quick session on the river recently with Stewie managing to land a 47cm and 42cm fish amongst a good bag of fish.

This month the Hopkins will be the venue for the final leg of the Vic Bream Tournament series on the weekend of August 15-16. The tournament’s entries are already full but if you’re in the area it is always worth coming down for a look at all the flash boats, watching the fish presented at the weigh-in and seeing what tackle and lure techniques anglers have been using.

Salmon action

There has been plenty of salmon action over the early part of winter, however the majority of fish have been below 1kg. Steve from Warrnambool Holiday Park has been regularly fishing Levy's during the late afternoon. Berleying with tuna frames he has been averaging seven fish a night all under 40cm. The Moyne River has also been producing small salmon as well as some King George whiting and silver trevally.

Trout

Trout fishing has been a little quiet of late but in July we received the best dump of rain for some months. Hopefully this fires the trout up so by August, the local streams open over winter are producing the quality trout they are famous for.

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Taken off Warrnambool this southern bluefin tuna weighed in at a massive 70kg.